White said that the UFC will be putting on live events for HBO and that the first UFC event on HBO will air this summer. When asked by a reporter if the HBO deal is "signed, sealed, and delivered," White said, "Yes." When asked if the deal should be reported as official, White said, "Yeah. We will be on HBO this summer." White also spoke of struggling to sign the HBO deal in the past tense, as he said, "We would have never signed a deal if we weren't comfortable with it."

White said that the UFC broadcasts on HBO will have an HBO production team and HBO announcers, so UFC announcers Mike Goldberg and Joe Rogan will not be doing commentary on the UFC's HBO events. White said that he doesn't know who will be on the HBO announcing team for UFC events, but when asked if Jim Lampley would be on the team, White said, "Hell no."

White inferred that the HBO events will be higher in stature than the Spike TV events but still lower in stature than the pay-per-view events. As an example, White said that you could expect to see the winners from future seasons of The Ultimate Fighter have their first post-TUF fights on HBO after they win the TUF competition, whereas the UFC Fight Night events would be the home for all of the fighters who are on TUF and get UFC contracts even though they didn't win the TUF competition.

White said that the UFC's June 16th event in Belfast, Northern Ireland will not be the HBO debut show, as he said that the June 16th show will be "on Spike TV or pay-per-view." The UFC web site previously said that the June 16th would be on Spike TV in the United States.

The statements made by White on Tuesday would seem to end a period of more than one year wherein the UFC and HBO were close to a deal but had not reached a deal. White has said consistently over the past year that the UFC would be on HBO "very soon," dating back to an April 2006 radio interview on 1140 KHTK in Sacramento, California.

Article By: Primetyme